People have the right to bear arms, but not the obligation to bear arms. Think about this distinction very carefully and really understand how powerful it can be. For any scenario where it is not prohibited by law, such as weapons being generally prohibited at an airport, a person has the right to make a choice.
A person has a right to make a choice as to whether or not to bear arms.
Ignore nuclear weapons or other weapons of mass destruction as not relevant to the analogy. In a confrontation, the person who brings the strongest weapon ever created can be said to have the second most powerful force. The person who does not bring a weapon at all can be said to have the most powerful force.
Police are armed with military surplus from the mightiest armed forces in the world. The police have access to more powerful weapons than the militaries of many other countries. To overcome this overwhelming power, make the choice not to bring any weapon at all.
When you leave your weapon at home, you help to minimize the excuse for a large amount of police to show up.
To slowly earn the respect of the police, obey the instructions of the police. Many people personally know a member of the police force. In a protest situation, police may be ordered to instruct protesters to act for various reasons that we cannot see or understand at that time, such as moving to a different location or dispersing for the safety of the public.
You want the police to treat you with the respect of being innocent until proven guilty. The police are people too. The police also want and deserve the same level of respect. At that time we don’t know if a protest is blocking access to medical treatment of someone who might die. At that time we don’t know if too many protestors may be in an area that can cause safety concerns like fire safety or the risk of being trampled or some other safety concern. Give the police the benefit of the doubt and assume they are innocent. If the police later prove guilty of misusing their power, it becomes an opportunity for protestors to receive additional media coverage ahead of the next protest event.
Come out. Make your voice heard. Follow the instructions of the police. Your voice will still have been heard and the impact on others will have been made, without providing an excuse for an escalation to violence.
If you suspect the motives of the police, ask them why. But please do not give them an excuse to resort to violence. Violence is consistently the preferred method of putting a halt to the effectiveness of protests.
It’s precisely because someone might throw rocks why the idea to chant PEACE-FUL PRO-TEST as a direct response has been proposed.
You can expect someone to eventually escalate. If not a protestor, it could be someone planted. To deal with either possibility, de-escalate with the chant. Face that person and direct the chant at that person. Make it clear to everyone else which person is resorting to violence by chanting at that person.
The news will have a difficult time if people chant PEACE-FUL PRO-TEST directly at anyone who attempts to escalate to violence. It’s also a chant to attempt to shame any anti-protestor into inaction who shows up pointing a weapon at protestors.
I don’t understand the Pikachu reference. I failed to find an answer. The links I found are not likely what you meant but I think they are worth a read for anyone who used the app.
https://www.dw.com/en/pokemon-go-players-themselves-are-the-real-prey-privacy-expert-warns/a-19450833
https://tdwi.org/articles/2016/07/13/pokemon-go-raises-privacy-safety-issues.aspx